Artist Research - George Zaky
The 3D artist i have chosen to look into for style inspiration for this project is a Freelance 3D modeller by the name of George Zaky. Based in Cairo, George Zaky creates 3D model bases to sell on Gumroad, Artstation and Sketchfab for others to build upon. On his art station in specific, Zaky highlights his proficiency in both 2D and 3D sofwares such as Blender, zbrush, substance painter and Gimp (Artstation, 2024). As an overview, This artist describes themselves as being a Low Poly 3D modeller and Character modeller (Artstation, 2024) with the vast majority of his portfolio consisting of humanoid models and bases.
Looking at Zaky’s work, it is evident that he works in a very blocky and exaggerated style. His models have a great amount of detail in the muscle groups creating anatomically accurate creatures that retain a sense of believability whilst still having exaggerated and unique silhouettes. He achieves this by using a lot of subtools separated into groups, highlighted by the different colours. Aside from this detail in the base forms, his models are left blank so that they can be edited and used for a wide range of applications. In the hashtags of each post, Zaky does confirm that his style is inspired by Disney, which is easy to see with the very cartoony and recognisable designs that really show the character’s personality through their body. I find his modelling style is incredibly expressive even in it’s simplicity, and opens up the opportunity to make a really strong character design. All of his bases are vastly different from one another, yet keep that cartoony style to them. For example, looking at his model Stylized Creature Blockout (George Zaky, 2023) This model leans more towards the hyper exaggerated masculine form, with a more inverted triangle shape and greater definition in the upper body muscle structures. This almost reminds me of the hulk and his over exaggerated muscle definition to infer the sense of extreme strength. In comparison to this, Cute Cartoon Female Blockout V1 (George Zaky, 2023) has a much more exaggerated female form, with greater emphasis on the hourglass shape of the torso and softer muscle definition to give a more feminine form. Both models are very different in silhouette, yet are recognisably in the same style with similar levels of detail in the visible muscle structures.
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Stylized Creature Blockout, 2023, George Zaky |
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Cute Cartoon Female Blockout V1, George Zaky, 2023 |
A company that works very similarly to George Zaky is a 3D studio based in Kazakhstan by the name of Existence. They are a team of 3D modellers specializing in a wide range of softwares both 2D and 3D but with the most prevalence being in Blender, Zbrush, Maya, Cinema 4D, 3Ds Max, and Substance painter (Artstation, 2024). Existence also make their models suitable to be imported into Unreal and Unity along with other games engines, it can be implied that to do this, they more than likely also rig, UV map and texture their own models. In this respect, they are a little different to George Zaky in the sense that they sell more finalized models, however this is a team working on these models as opposed to one person. In art style respects, these two artists work in a similar blocky, exaggerated and cartoony style very reminiscent of Disney and Pixar animators.
Existence’s models have a great amount of detail in the muscle structures giving their models a recognisable silhouette, however also put in texture and material considerations to really help push their designs further. These models are finished assets rather than bases but still retain the same overall feel to George Zaky’s work. In my opinion, these models look more suitable for a games setting with their look reminding me of more stylized videogames such as League of legends (Riot Games, 2009), Overwatch (Blizzard, 2016) and perhaps even Sea of Thieves (Rare, 2018).
Two models that really stood out to me was the Alien Creature 01 – Low Poly Stylized Monsters – Animation Fantasy UFO Character Predator #14 (Existence, 2023) and Stylized Warrior 05 - #43 (Existence, 2024). I Really like the Lumpy, gaunt look of the alien with it’s entirely inhuman face, it looks strong, uncanny and intimidating and i think matches the overall feel of what i hope to create in this project. With the Warrior, although not fitting for what i hope to model for this project, i felt this model was similar to George Zaky’s Female model in the sense that it shows how the artist has exaggerated the female form by manipulating those muscle groups to result in a model that shows a great amount of physical strength whilst still reading as being quite feminine in the silhouette. My reasoning to choose a more exaggerated and stylized approach to 3D art rather than something more realistic is for two reasons, i feel these characters hold a lot of personality and expressiveness just in how they are modelled and their designs almost tell a story to where these characters are from and what type of person they are. I would like my model to reflect on this and hopefully capture this expressiveness. On top of this, i feel i would be able to model something like this than something more realistic with the skill sets that i have, This art style will certainly push me to make something new, but i wont be so far out of my comfort zone that i will feel discouraged to finish this project. Finally, i just find this style to be very visually appealing and i think i should be able to copy it to the best of my ability.
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Alien Creature 01 – Low Poly Stylized Monsters – Animation Fantasy UFO Character Predator #14, Existence, 2023 |
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Stylized Warrior 05 - #43, Existence, 2024 |
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